Staff writer
High school debates can be just as contentious and fiery as any political war of words.
Last year, Beth Nesser and Taylor Harms, who form one of two Marion High School debate teams for the 2009-10 season, had their moral views questioned. When Harms answered truthfully, slightly contradicting her argument, the other team won the debate.
“They called us liars,” Harms said.
Chris Guetersloh and E.J. Obermeyer form Marion’s other debate team and prefer to be on the opposing side to an argument. Each team has a case that they work on and try to perfect for every debate season. The topic of the debate stays consistent throughout the year and teams either argue for their case or argue against the case of another team.
“The negative can assume,” Guetersloh said. “The affirmative has the burden of proof.”
Guetersloh is an expert of cross-examination: the period of the debate where the negative team asks questions to disprove the affirmative team’s case. Obermeyer, Harms, and Nesser agree that Guetersloh is the best person on the Marion squad at asking questions that catch a team by surprise. Guetersloh is also persistent in his badgering.
“Chris made a kid cry,” Obermeyer said.
The four members of the two Marion teams each have their specific strengths. Obermeyer is a quick thinker and can write a case fast. Nesser is a studious researcher; she found supporting facts, statistics, and a unique case. Harms is the best debater at using emotion to enhance her argument.
The debate season is already under way; each team participated in their first debate Nov. 29.
This year’s national topic that is used at every meet is poverty. Both Marion teams found an effective program to use for their cases. Guetersloh and Obermeyer are using a cash incentive program they found in the Baylor Briefs. The program allows for people living under the poverty line to perform community service to receive cash and other benefits.
Nesser and Harms found a program called New Hope that has been used periodically in Milwaukee for the past 10 years. New Hope is a tiered program: the first step is to try to find a recipient a job. If that doesn’t work, the second step is to provide a person with benefits like child care, and then have the recipients perform community service.
“Milwaukee was the seventh most poverty-stricken city in the United States,” Nesser said. “They started using New Hope and poverty went way down.”
The students have to find a way to pay for their programs. Guetersloh and Obermeyer are proposing a 1 percent tax increase on soda and toilet paper, which they calculated to accumulate $20 billion.
Each of the four Marion students has been researching his or her case, mostly with the Internet, for months. Harms and Nesser found the New Hope program this summer and have been working on their arguments ever since.
“Debate requires someone who has basic knowledge of many subjects,” Marion High School speech and debate teacher Mary Griffith said. “A person needs to be aware of history, government, and current events.”
Griffith also talked about the way debate develops certain skills.
“It helps with oral communication, note-taking, research,” she said, “and if they really don’t believe what they are saying, I suppose it makes them become pretty good actors.”
Griffith talked about some of the attorneys who participated in debate including Phil Haines, Ashley DeForest, and Isaac Guetersloh.
Debate is in the Guetersloh genes. Chris and Isaac both participated in debate and their mom was the president of a debate club.
“My house likes to argue,” Chris Guetersloh said.